In the U.S., an angioplasty costs $32,000. Elsewhere? Maybe $6,400. [View all]
Why does health care cost so much more in the United States than in other countries? As health economists love to say: “It’s the prices, stupid.”
As politicians continue to lament the system’s expense, and more Americans struggle to pay the high and often unpredictable bills that can accompany their health problems, it’s worth looking at just how weird our prices really are relative to the rest of the world.
The International Federation of Health Plans, a group representing the CEOs of health insurers worldwide, publishes a guide every few years on the international cost for common medical services. Its newest report, on 2017 prices, came out this month. Every time, the upshot is vivid and similar: For almost everything on the list, there is a large divergence between the United States and everyone else.
Patients and insurance companies in the United States pay higher prices for medications, imaging tests, basic health visits and common operations. Those high prices make health care in the U.S. extremely expensive, and they also finance a robust and politically powerful health care industry, which means lowering prices will always be hard.
For a typical angioplasty, a procedure that opens a blocked blood vessel to the heart, the average U.S. price is $32,200, compared with $6,400 in the Netherlands, or $7,400 in Switzerland, the survey finds. A typical MRI scan costs $1,420 in the United States, but around $450 in Britain. An injection of Herceptin, an important breast cancer treatment, costs $211 in the United States, compared with $44 in South Africa. These examples aren’t outliers.
https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2019/12/27/in-the-u-s-an-angioplasty-costs-32-000-elsewhere.html?ana=e_du_prem&j=90405391&t=Afternoon&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTkdZNU9HSmlOV1l6WmpGbCIsInQiOiJpU1p6ZEV3Y1RiWTNBTnZjTmFQYXV0bm9IM2ZZK1BLajJXa2g2TlFtemhTcnVqd2tJSDdpa2d2YjEwR1hJK3YzdVNRczlUdmxXWlZcL2dTMVE3RzE4XC9SMWQ3YzhtbjlSNHpsT2tGU254SWNkaDR5S1pUK0d0VjZYSFVLa2EwZlRRIn0%3D
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